Enterprise Arrives at the Big Apple

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Icons of America are captured together in a fantastic photo by NASA photographer Bill Ingalls, taken on the morning of April 27, 2012 from Jersey City, NJ. The Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building… and Enterprise, the first space shuttle, seen as it was ferried toward its eventual new home at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum.

After several days of delays due to weather, the SCA with mounted Enterprise took off from Washington Dulles International Airport this morning.

Enterprise was the first shuttle built for NASA. It was used to conduct test flights in the atmosphere and never flew into space, yet the data gathered from its experimental flights were integral to the development of the shuttle program.

Originally housed at the Smithsonian’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, Enterprise will be demated from the SCA (Shuttle Carrier Aircraft) and placed on a barge that will travel on a 2-day trip up the Hudson to the Intrepid Museum on June 4.

Enterprise departs Dulles on Friday, April 27. (NASA/Smithsonian Institution/Mark Avino)Enterprise over Manhattan, its future home seen below. (Click for description.) NASA/Robert Markowitz.

Discovery was flown in from the Kennedy Space Center after they fixed it up to make it safe to be exhibited. Enterprise was already at the Smithsonian, but Discovery as the flagship shuttle was the one destined for there. So, yes, Discovery to DC (actually northern Virginia), and Enterprise to New York.

Atlantis is staying at KSC, it will be displayed at the KSC Visitor Center by summer next year, and Endeavor will find a new home at the California Science Center in Los Angeles sometime next year as well.

Mr. Patterson many people loved the shuttle program. One can make the assumption that you are in the minority that think that expenditures in a space program are a total loss. If you don’t like this stuff please find a more appropriate place to point this out.